http://www.jewishworldreview.com --
NEAR THE END of Joe Klein's rough draft of his upcoming book about Bill
Clinton's bizarre presidency, published in the Oct. 16 New Yorker, he
summarizes, in one sentence, the ugly duck's legacy. Klein: "It is
possible that the Clinton era will be remembered as the moment when the
distance between the President and the public evaporated forever."
Clinton didn't disagree, saying, "I'm not sure that's such a bad thing.
We need to demystify the job. It is a job..."

I thought about this last Saturday night when Mrs. M and I had supper
at Sparks, along with relatives of hers from Los Angeles. (One of whom,
my father-in-law Rudy, a reliable Democrat, admitted he might vote for
George W. Bush.) Sparks is an upscale restaurant, one of the finest in
Manhattan, with an encyclopedic wine list, superb sirloins and lobsters
and an all-male squad of waiters who cater to a customer's every whim.

Yet, looking around the huge dining room, it was appalling to see the
attire of most of that night's clientele. Less than 20 percent of the
men bothered to wear a tie or suit; women were dressed in sweats; the
table next to ours housed two chubby teenagers with backwards baseball
caps (how cool is that, guys?); and I counted more t-shirts than you'd
see during a sunny afternoon on the Coney Island boardwalk.
Sparks, Denny's, Hooters, it's all the same. Just as Clinton has
"demystified" the presidency with his jogging shorts, cheating at golf,
jerking off in West Wing sinks, wearing jeans during international
summit meetings, America has become a nation of self-satisfied slobs.

(I
understand that part of this abominable cultural evolution has nothing
to do with Clinton. The days when women wore white gloves and little
boys donned Sunday school suits for airline flights are gone forever.)

The process is similar to the one by which John F. Kennedy's disdain for
hats almost put an industry out of business. It was gradual: In the
famous photo of Jack Ruby gunning down Lee Harvey Oswald on Nov. 24,
1963, most of the men still wore Stetsons or fedoras; and in newsreels
of baseball games of the era, the stands were full of men, of all
economic brackets, with hats perched upon their heads. But not too many
years later, hats were seldom to be found.

Clinton has accelerated the dumbing down of the presidency. I'm not
making a case for a royal separation between a country's leader and its
citizens, but it's disgraceful that the President of the United States
has no dignity. Last spring, in Manhattan, the financial companies
suddenly abandoned their ritual dress code: every day was now "casual
Friday," causing severe heartburn, I'm sure, for clothiers like Paul
Stuart, Brooks Brothers and Brioni. I doubt that would've happened
without Clinton's slovenly appearances, not to mention Al Gore's
shedding his blue suits for poll-tested tight khakis and polo shirts on
the campaign trail.

Yes, perhaps this dedicated follower of fashion is putting too much of
a burden on Clinton himself for the decline in manners and pride of
appearance in this country. But wasn't it grand that Ronald Reagan never
entered the Oval Office without wearing a suit and tie?

LET ME BE CLEAR
THERE ARE numerous reasons why I prefer George W. Bush-who's on the
verge of winning the presidency-to his Democratic competitor Al Gore.
The nuts and bolts case for Bush's candidacy is clear: far from being
the witless dilettante the elite media has evoked in its ongoing
caricature of him, the Texas Governor has proposed the most visionary
blueprint for the United States in 40 years. Unlike Gore, who was
painstakingly groomed for the White House since he was a toddler, which
has led him to do or say anything to fulfill that goal, Bush, like
Reagan, came to politics later in his life.

Although born into privilege, Bush floundered about in college,
attempted a career in business, sometimes successfully, other times not,
before shocking the pundits by defeating the popular Texas Gov. Ann
Richards in 1994. Critics have said that Bush's Austin "iron triangle"
of strategists has encased him in a bubble, fearful that he'll
mispronounce a four-syllable word. Fine, that's suitable material for
late-night comics. But think about the bubble Gore's been in for his
entire life. The second child of domineering parents, Gore never really
had an opportunity to wander far from his self-imposed destiny.

At the Al Smith charity dinner in New York last week, Gore joked that
Bush's Republican platform would build a bridge to the 1930s. It was a
passable one-liner, and appropriate for the occasion. But even a cursory
examination of the stark differences in the campaign pledges of Bush and
Gore proves that the latter is stuck in the quicksand of the 1960s.

While Bush acknowledges that Social Security was a necessary entitlement
when it was enacted in desperate times by FDR, he now wants to modernize
the program to conform with the realities of the 21st century. Gore says
if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Bush also says he'll gut the
anachronistic, bureaucratic maze known as Medicare and transform it into
a subsidy that doesn't pit the old against the young.

Bush has discussed in detail his desire for a complex missile defense
system, as well as for restoring the morale of the military and
refurbishing its equipment, realizing that with the end of the Cold War,
other international crises-which we can't precisely pinpoint now-will
inevitably occur. Gore scoffs at these plans, puffing out his chest and
stating the obvious: that the United States' armed forces are the
strongest in the world. Thanks for the wake-up call, Gen. Gore, but your
administration can't boast of having developed a coherent international
doctrine in the past eight years. Why was a pharmaceutical company in
Sudan bombed? Why was Baghdad blitzkrieged on the eve of Clinton's
impeachment-when it was clear such a mission could have, and should
have, been undertaken months earlier?

Gore, in hock to most unions in the country, makes robust promises
about restoring the public school system, making it a pillar of
excellence: hiring more teachers, buying more computers, etc. But he
really hasn't the foggiest about why schools are failing at a local
level. During his Harlem debate last winter with primary challenger Bill
Bradley, the sad-sack, contemporary Adlai Stevenson, Time's Tamala
Edwards asked the Vice President why he didn't send his own children to
public schools. He dodged the reporter, and thus raised questions about
his competence to speak on the issue.

On the other hand, Bush has had a successful record on education in
Texas, holding local schools to strict accountability, and has seen
positive testing results in just the past few years. Bush is for
increased school choice-vouchers is the word, although it's not often
used explicitly in this media-distorted campaign-and the opportunity for
parents and local officials to act in response to a municipality's
unique needs. Education is traditionally considered a Democratic
concern-G-d knows why, since the prevailing infrastructure is a mess-but
Bush has shrewdly co-opted the hot-button issue and made inroads into
Gore's base of voters.

Then there's the question of taxes. Gore, foaming with the kind of
rhetoric that's made him such an unlikable candidate, has distorted
Bush's equitable plan, practicing class warfare by saying the Governor
intends to reward only the very wealthy. In reality, Bush has laid out a
simple tax-cut table that benefits all Americans, regardless of income.
He'd decrease the top marginal rate from 39.6 percent to 33 percent; on
the other end of the scale, those in the 15-percent bracket would have
their taxes reduced to 10 percent. In addition, Bush'd abolish the
undemocratic estate tax, yet another heinous example of government
invading the lives of its citizens, sometimes destroying the businesses
for which people have worked their entire adult lives so that they can
bequeath something to their children.

There's the queer notion that in a country that's driven by capitalism,
the affluent should be punished for being successful. That's the impetus
for trial lawyers gouging corporations; that's the reason why left-wing
activists, often wealthy themselves, believe in the redistribution of
wealth. Bush doesn't believe in any of this nonsense. It's his
contention that all Americans should be treated equally, that no one
should be screwed by a class-conscious government; that it's morally
wrong to penalize those hard-working citizens, who, as Bill Clinton said
years ago, "play by the rules." It makes you wonder about some of Gore's
celebrity supporters. If they're so concerned about the economic
disparity that's inevitable in a nonsocialist state, why don't they
divest themselves of their fortunes and put some heft behind their
beliefs, instead of merely writing checks to the Gore and Hillary
Clinton campaigns?

In addition, Bush will attract to his administration the most able of
his father's advisers, as well as some of the smartest and most capable
conservative men and women at both the federal and state levels. Such
breadth of talent hasn't been seen in decades. Needless to say, Bill
Richardson, Janet Reno and Madeleine Albright won't be receiving phone
calls from Austin on Nov. 8.

You get the feeling that Gore, as a micro-manager, will appoint himself
to every cabinet position, with the exception perhaps of attorney
general, which he'll reserve for Tony Coelho. And while a Bush
administration won't be staffed according to quotas, as Clinton's
was-funny, though, how many rich lawyers the Arkansan chose to represent
the "face of America"-Bush's record of bipartisanship and fostering
diversity as governor of Texas could be a model for the country.

That's the main governmental reason to vote for Bush. If he fails to
deliver, Americans will give him the hook in four years. I must also
note, however, that like any future president, there are goals and ideas
that can't be revealed during a campaign. For example, if John F.
Kennedy had made a central issue his dream of sending a man to the moon
by the end of the 60s, citizens would've thought his brain was made of
green cheese. Similarly, Bush has a 21st-century vision for America
that, should he be elected, won't be revealed until his administration
is under way. I'm not privy to Bush's aspirations, but he's hinted
broadly at a shift in the way the United States involves itself with
countries in the Western Hemisphere. Canada and Mexico, not to mention
the rest of Latin America, I suspect, will be integral to Bush's
international
interests.

JWR contributor "Mugger" -- aka Russ Smith -- is the editor-in-chief and CEO of New York Press (www.nypress.com). Send your comments to him by clicking here.